“Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius. Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius.”Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

This last week on Mad Swirl’s Poetry Forum… we got no relief from an ancestral thief; we constructed answers from questionable motives; we fired up three from a quitter’s votives; we exposed the predator in an artless editor; we suffered paralysis from beauty analysis; we talked some trash ’bout a trinity splash; we coaxed some pie from a painted tie. We conjured, constructed but never obstructed this succession of creative expression. ~ MH Clay

Night Thoughts to Raymond Scott’s Suite for Violin and Piano by Jeff Grimshaw

On the landing.
A hand painted neck tie
wrapped around my knuckles.
Somebody doing the dishes and singing
a song about summertime.

My mind needs more colors
only softer.
She gotta wash the sheets.
One of her toe nails looks funky and
I don’t like it. She doesn’t
like it either.
Painting it bright red isn’t the answer
to anything. I like the light
around the edge of the door,
It makes me think about
a party happening in there.

So now I’m on the subway
dreaming about carrots.
Now I’m on the subway
thinking somebody here didn’t change his socks today.
Now I’m on the subway
wondering if the end of the line is somewhere
nobody is allowed to talk about,
someplace a thousand miles away and
You have to get on the right car
at the right time. Someplace with ice.

It hurts to make a fist.
It hurts to make a decent pot roast.
It hurts to make a moon pie do the things
a moon pie don’t wanna do. I think that’s a song.

When you remember to water the plants
everything is better, even the things
that have nothing to do with the plants.

So now I’m tying the tie around my neck.
It has the Chrysler Building painted on it.
It made me happy when I bought it,
I dug into my pocket for ten bucks
and thought, ‘wait a minute, how do I wash the thing?’
and that made me happy, too.

Just pick the bugs off, I said, walking down the street
on the balls of my feet like a boxer, like a dancer,
Pick off the bugs and watch the fork
when you’re eating pasta. You’ll be fine.

three cigarettes today
but today is a brand new day, I remind myself
I’ll get through alarms, reminders and to-do lists

a pile of jumbled words running in my head like typists’ fingers – tap tap tap
heart racing, out of breath, collapsing, interrupting to hold another breath
breath-less but still working – thump thump thump

there are fifteen faces I’ve to greet
faces will suddenly grow like omelettes on an oversized pan
from the days I’ve skipped breakfast

spreading, increasing amoeba-like but magnified
cup shaped fingers like fat wires of a blown out socket
reaching out to me like grim reaper’s slimy fingers

Of course I couldn’t find my sunglasses on what turned out to be the most blinding day of the year, also known as the day Jeff and Ally got married.

“It’s rude to wear sunglasses to a wedding,” my own wife reminded me, hand on hip, watching as I lifted everything but the refrigerator in my quest.

“According to who, the God of weddings? Screw him, he’s probably a prick like all the other gods. Are you not going to help me look? They’re LaCroix.”

“We don’t have the time. Worst comes to worst, the maids will find them.”

Jeff’s been a solid friend since grade eight, but I couldn’t think of anything else besides the mystery location of my not cheap sunglasses from the time we approached the club to the time I joined Teddy at the designated smoking area. Engaging in such reprobate behavior on such a sacred day helped blow some of the bubbles away from my guts…

Will sunglasses be found? Will Jeff & Ally’s wedding be nuptially delish? Guess you’ll have to find that out right here!

•••••••

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